Monday, November 1, 2010

Back in the Saddle Again

Back on the bike again today after school. Down to Haleiwa, around town, then back up the hill. I had to get back on the bike. Why? you ask. Simple, my curious reader: I have registered for another tri. And this one is in two weeks. That's right, I had so much fun at my last one I decided to get one more in before the season ends. I'll be doing the Haleiwa Triathlon on Nov. 14th. It is overall a shorter race than the last one, with a 400m swim, a 12mi ride, and a 3.1mi run. So not much shorter, but shorter. I decided to buy another $80 shirt because I want to get as much experience as I can doing these. That way I can get better faster. I'm already in shape from the last race, I took a full week off afterwards to be sick, recover, and spend time with the family that was on island. And now I'm back at it for an abbreviated training cycle. Pretty much, not counting today, I'll be rewinding my training plan two weeks and going from there. Today was supposed to be T2 according to the plan, but I thought I would be better served getting out and getting some miles back on my legs. This was a good idea.The first workout back after any kind of break is always the toughest and even though it was a short break I'm still not 100% over the cold I let overtake me Monday. So the ride was kind of rough. It felt ok, not fantastic, but not all that fast either. I actually think I pulled pretty well up the hill. I'm trying to get comfortable down on the drops rather than up on the top of the bars. That makes me a little more aerodynamic and puts me in more of a race position. Nearly everyone who passed me Sunday was down on aerobars. I don't have those, so I'm making due. But getting used to riding on the drops will, I think, help me make the transition to aerobars when I find my own bike.Funny story, on the way up the hill today I passed a guy on another bicycle. He pulled up on my wheel and we got to talking. My first on-bike conversation. Check. He called up to me, "Hey, you borrow that bike?""Uhh, yeah.""From a guy named Obi Tri Kenobi?""Holy crap, yeah. How'd you know?""I borrowed that bike from him back in August for a century. Thought it looked familiar."Dude turned out to be a sailor from Florida who knew Obi Tri through friends. He was back on island doing a lap on a rental. Part of our conversation was, "Man, I hate this hill after 86 miles." And I thought, "Dude, I'm not a fan of this hill after 12 miles." He told me he's ridden a century (that's 100 miles straight through, one day) once a month since '07. And sometimes its hard for him because he has to use leave time to do it. Another crazy person! Nice guy though. He dropped back after a mile or so to conserve energy and I surged ahead. My first pass! Check.So I'm back at it for another two weeks. After this I'm looking at a tri in April for number three unless something shows up on the calendar later. I may sign up for a 10k or a cycle race or a swim to get some more racing under my belt between now and then. Almost forgot how much I love racing. Also need to find myself a ride. Craigslist is less than helpful, but a huge tease. This tri should be fun though. If you check out the course description you'll see that the final mile of the run is on the beach. Ohhh, sand running after a 400m swim, a 12mi ride, and 2mi of running! Yay! This might feel like burning. But in a good way.I'm worried I'm hooked on this whole triathlon thing. Here we go again.

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